Gary Johnson Speaks With His Tongue Hanging Out During TV Interview [Video]
Libertarian Party presidential candidate Gary Johnson met with MSNBC’s Kasie Hunt for an interview this week. During the interview they discussed Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton, the Syrian conflict, and the upcoming presidential debates, according to a tweet on Hunt’s official Twitter account that included a clip from the interview.
The discussion of the debates prompted a truly peculiar episode in which Johnson spoke while sticking his tongue out for what seemed like an excruciatingly long amount of time.
“Do you think that if you were able to get on the debate stage, you could pull even with Trump and Clinton in these polls,” Hunt asked
“I do,” Johnson replied, “And it wouldn’t have anything to do with my debate performance either. It would just be because people recognize that there’s another choice.”
Johnson continued, acting like a normal adult, until he got to the end.
“I think I could stand up there for the whole debate and not say anything and emerge as the leader,” Johnson said, with his tongue sticking out from between his lips the whole time.
Hunt appeared to recoil initially, and then seemed to be holding back laughter until Johnson finished. As the clip ends, she has a look of awkward confusion on her face.
I interviewed Gary Johnson this week. We talked about Trump, Clinton, Syria – and the debates, to which he said:???? https://t.co/W0VKER4FgY
— Kasie Hunt (@kasie) September 23, 2016
The segment aired on an episode of MSNBC’s Morning Joe.
“You sat down recently with libertarian nominee — candidate — Gary Johnson for what can only be described as unusual,” MSNBC co-host Mika Brzezinski said to Hunt as she introduced the clip on the show.
After watching the clip, the Morning Joe guests and commentators were left speechless. There were also a few chuckles.
“It’s never happened to me in an interview before,” Hunt chimed in to break the silence. “Otherwise we had a very lengthy, extended conversation.”
Brzezinski, still dumbfounded by Johnson’s tongue spectacle, asked her producers, “Can you play that again?”
“No, I’m serious,” she added. “Like, did he do that? I need to see that.”
They played the clip again.
After seeing Johnson sticking his tongue out for the second time, Brzezinski just put her head down and said, “No, no, no, no,” over and over.
It was yet another bizarre moment in a bizarre presidential campaign season. It wasn’t Johnson’s first major gaffe either. In recent weeks he’s said a few things that have raised eyebrows.
On 8 September, MSNBC host Mike Barnicle asked Johnson what he would do about the humanitarian crisis in Aleppo, the besieged city at the center of the Syrian conflict.
“What is Aleppo?” Johnson replied, according to a report from Politico.
“You’re kidding,” Barnicle said incredulously, pushing Johnson.
Gary Johnson’s Moment: What’s Aleppo? Who’s John Galt? https://t.co/EnxluNzN4r #GaryJohnson #JohnGalt #Aleppo pic.twitter.com/nJOsHOBc7F
— The Daily Caller (@DailyCaller) September 14, 2016
When Johnson maintained that in fact he did know what Aleppo is, Barnicle gave him a brief primer. Johnson’s rambling, aimless answer after that, as reported by Politico, wasn’t much better than his initial goof up. He basically just acknowledged that Syria is a mess and that regime change is usually a bad idea.
“Okay, Got it. Well, with regard to Syria, I do think that it’s a mess. I think the only way that we deal with Syria is to join hands with Russia to diplomatically bring that at an end but when we’ve aligned ourselves with — when we have supported the opposition, the Free Syrian Army, the Free Syrian Army is also coupled with the Islamists, and then the fact that we’re also supporting the Kurds and this is, it’s just a mess. And this is the result of regime change that we end up supporting and, inevitably, these regime changes have led to a less safe world.”
Footage of Gary Johnson speaking at a 2011 National Press Club luncheon also resurfaced recently. When asked about combating climate change, Johnson said that if we take the “long-term view” we don’t have to worry about it because eventually the Earth will be destroyed when the sun supernovas anyway.
“In billions of years, the sun is going to actually grow and encompass the Earth, right? So global warming is in our future,” Johnson said, as reported by USA Today.
Needless to say, it’s been a rough month for Gary Johnson. Wagging his tongue at a reporter certainly isn’t going to help.
https://youtu.be/j_azcqlYC2s
[Featured image by Alex Wong/Getty Images]
